


Infinity Falls

by Artistic_Arteries



Series: Gravity Train Central Station [1]
Category: Gravity Falls, Infinity Train (Cartoon)
Genre: "Ford has the emotional IQ of a rock", 1970s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Divergence - A Tale of Two Stans, Crossover, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Ford Pines Needs a Hug, Ford Pines is a Jerk, Ford is forced to work through his problems, Gen, Mullet Stan Pines, Mystery Trio, POV Ford Pines, Protective Stan Pines, Stan Pines Needs A Hug, Stangst, Twins, also not exactly canon to infinity train after book 2 gave us more info, alternate universe - infinity train
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22059667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artistic_Arteries/pseuds/Artistic_Arteries
Summary: While in the forest ignoring the date and avoiding Fiddleford, Ford finds a mysterious train that is sure to keep him occupied for a few hours.*Part one of an ongoing series!*
Relationships: Fiddleford H. McGucket/Ford Pines, Ford Pines & Stan Pines
Series: Gravity Train Central Station [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1667353
Comments: 176
Kudos: 155





	1. Escapism - MYSTERY

The deep woods are as lively as ever, the birds singing, woodpeckers digging into trees for bugs, the occasional gnome foraging for mushrooms and nuts, the usual. The early afternoon sun is hot above him, the trees doing little to cool him as the humid air carries the heat into the shade. All in all its an unremarkable day, totally nothing special, an average June day. If anyone -namely Fiddleford- would ask him why he’s ignoring the significance of the date, he would simply say “oh is that today?” The date, of course, was June 15th, and anyone who knew him well would know that today was his birthday. Anyone who knew him intimately well would know that he’s avoiding today because he wasn’t the only one whose birthday is today. 

Fiddleford is one of the people who knows him intimately well, which is why he’s out alone in the middle of the woods in the heat of the day. His friend and partner is very family centric, which means that he pesters him about the date and the importance of keeping in touch with his family and such. Fiddleford is also very convivial, being that no matter the holiday, he loves to go all out. Easter egg hunts with hundreds of eggs; giant, barely legal fourth of July fire work shows; Valentine’s day cards for everyone he knew and loved; too much food for any two men to eat for Thanksgiving and Christmas; leading up to December 25th, he takes a whole ordeal that makes the house look like a holiday store isle, and birthdays? Birthdays are a celebration of life and memories, Fiddleford's family often had traditions that involved baby pictures and stories. 

So, when Ford’s birthday rolls around, he’s been taking to spending the whole day hiding in the woods doing research. 

Which leads back to now. Today, the fifteenth of June, 1979, is his 24th birthday. It is also his twin brother's birthday, naturally. His estranged, outcast brother who he hasn’t seen or heard from in nearly eight years.

He tries very hard to not think about Stanley, to block out thoughts about the person he grew up next to; but every now and then he catches himself doodling boats in his journals or spare papers, making references when talking to Fiddleford that only Stan would understand, and having dreams about their childhood. He already thinks about him whenever he looks in the mirror, he doesn’t need Fiddleford to make such a big deal about his birthday. 

He sits down, writing some notes on gnome diets. He was constantly adding onto it since he caught one eating an aluminum can from his garbage. He captured the culprit and tried to perform surgery to remove it, only to find that the gnome's stomach acid was digesting it just fine. It seems like gnomes are the true omnivore -well, aside from Stanley. He looks at the note he had made on it, subconsciously writing what he thought. He grimaces and scratches out Stan’s name. 

He hears a nearby train, the horn signaling it’s presence, followed by the sound of wheels turning on tracks. It’s too close to be from the cliff's tracks, he realizes. He stands, closing the journal quickly. He follows the sound, the forest silent apart from the din of the train. He steps under some low hanging branches, a bright green light filtering through the needles. In front of him, a train races past him and deeper into the woods, it’s bright green lights near blinding. He steps onto the cement train halt before him, the train slowing to a stop. The door opens as the sign above the door flips to show the word “MYSTERY”. 

Let it be known that Stanford Pines has never been known to shy away from discovery. This fact has landed him in the hospital a handful of times within these last six years of living in Gravity Falls, and has been the cause of a lot more than a handful of headaches for Fiddleford as he tries to keep Ford out of the hospital. The fact that he’s gotten injured because of his curiosity has not made him any more wary than he was before any of said injuries. Because as the saying goes, curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back. 

He steps onto the train.

The light from within blinds him, before he’s purged in the darkness of unconsciousness. 

Stanford starts to wake up, his eyes opening slowly, before snapping open. He’s not where he remembers being last. He sits up, looking around him. He’s in a long tunnel, the walls look like smoothed down clay. Stalactites hang from the middle of the ceiling, from the tips of them are small glowing orbs. On the smooth walls, he sees murals of a man carrying a torch, running and jumping to the painted stalactites, lighting their pointed ends. The murals are reminiscent of Egyptian murals, but softer, less idealistic and with more body fat. Ford tries to think of what they’re more similar to. 

He takes out his journal and starts writing.

_As I was walking in the woods today, I came across a strange train that came out of nowhere and had no discernable end nor beginning. It stopped and a door opened, I went into it and lost consciousness. When I awoke, I found myself in a tunnel with murals on the wall._

He doodles a small picture of the mural.

“Mayan! It looks Mayan”

He writes that down and puts his journal away and starts walking down the tunnel. The figure seems to repeat perfectly: jump, land, run, jump, repeat. He walks about 10 yards when he comes to a door. The handle is two half circles, shaped almost like a backwards s. He turns the half circles clockwise, the door's mechanism audibly opening inside the red exterior. Through the door, he can hear the wheels turning. He sees the outside world rushing past, a barren land unlike anything he’s seen on Earth. 

“This _is_ the train.” He exclaims to himself.

He looks over the bridge, to the connecting train car. The grin on his face grows to become near crazed. He takes off over the bridge and through the next door. 

The inside of the car is larger than it should be, compared to the size of the outside. He’s in a grassy plane, an open landscape he can’t see the ends of, the few trees he sees look like acacia trees with the way they grow sideways. It’s almost like Africa, but the large stone pillars that go to the sky are distinctly non-African. He walks around the pillars, inspecting five or six of them before finding a door like the other two he’s gone through embedded into one of them. The pillar is seemingly identical to the others, and clearly doesn’t connect to anything else, so when he opens the door, he’s pleasantly intrigued by the fact that it’s the other end of the train car. 

_The doors are more like portals, rather than normal doors._ He writes, he then doodles two doors separated by a few centimeters and a man walking through either end, disappearing in the middle. 

Amazing. 

He looks around outside the train car, leaning over the rail carefully to see if he could see the end of the train. It goes farther than what his eyes can see in either direction. The train is also much larger than what it was when he got on it, the wheels seem to be fifteen, maybe twenty feet in diameter. The train cars are easily thirty feet tall. Perhaps the train he boarded was simply the way the train interacted with his home plane? The theories in his mind snowball and multiply until he’s bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement. He could be on another plane of existence entirely. 

Out in the barren wasteland, he sees a few lone trees. Above, he sees a storm brewing, the clouds forming a spiral like a hurricane or a tornado. Suddenly, the clouds start to spiral faster, forming a cone. He barely feels a change in the wind, even as what appears to be a tornado forms a few miles in front of him. The tail of the tornado doesn’t touch the ground, but instead twists towards one of the train cars behind the car he exited last. It connects, and the tornado lights up a bright yellow color. It’s only a moment before he sees a humanoid shape get sucked into the light and deconstructed in front of him. 

He feels a tightening in his chest, his breath catching in his lungs. The tornado recedes to the sky before a powerful beam of energy strikes the ground below the center of the storm. Whatever this anomaly is, it just might’ve killed somebody. 

Dangerous.

 _Amazing_ and dangerous, he thinks.

He isn’t deterred. Now he just wants to get to the bottom of the mystery more. If this anomaly is hurting people, then he needs to figure out how to stop it. He pulls out his journal, but before he can start writing, he notices the hand he usually holds his journal with while writing is glowing. Opening his hand, he sees a number glowing a bright green written on his palm. 

**_240_ **

He touches it with his other thumb, the number doesn’t smudge or dim. 

He makes note of it on a new page in his journal. _Train number on Hand_ he labels the new page. Going back to the earlier page, he labels it _The Infinity Train_

 _I’m not alone on this train,_ he writes, _it seems like there was someone else. Outside the train, I saw a tornado like phenomenon that sucked out a humanoid shape and evaporated them. The train is more dangerous than I first thought._

To get to the bottom of this mystery, he needs to get to the beginning, he decides. He has to get to the front of the train. 

On to the next train car, then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me things in the comments or come yell at me on Tumblr! Even if it's just a smiley face or a quote you liked! Comments > kutos!! <3
> 
> Even if this fic is old, for real, I love comments.


	2. The mushroom car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stanford meets someone who has the answers he's looking for.

Ford moves his rook, putting the black king into checkmate. The humanoid chess piece dramatically falls to his knees. The black queen walks back onto the game board, retrieves something from the black king, and approaches Ford. She hands him a card that says “thanks for playing” and turns back to her people, she motions something to a pawn, who rushes to the exit door, unlocking it. He puts the card into his pocket and waves to the chess people before leaving.

 _‘Chess people',_ he writes, _'black and white humanoid creatures of varying shapes and sizes with outfits that denote chess piece roles. Their bodies seemed to consist of hard shell like substance, like porcelain.’_ He puts the card from his pocket in the page, before closing his journal. He was trying to keep the journal entries short, as he had already filled 20 pages with the previous train cars, and had no idea what he would do if he ran out of space. 

According to his watch, it’s been about 8 hours since he got on the train, which might not mean anything, if time works differently on the train. But if time here did run parallel to earth time, then it would be about 12 am on June 16th. He sits down on the train ledge, watching the dry terrain go by quickly. He wonders, briefly, where Stan was, while he was on this train for a whole chunk of their birthday. He shakes his head to dismiss the thought, and as he does, he notices the number on his hand go up to 246. 

“What the..? Why did it go up?” he asks himself. He stares at his hand for a moment, then pokes and prods the number. When it doesn’t change, he opens his journal and flips to the page on the number on his hand. Luckily, he thought that it would be more important than individual train cars, so he kept most of the page clear. 

_‘The number on my hand has changed! While taking a short break from traversing train cars, my number changed from 240 to 246! I’m not sure what caused it, but this might be the key to the mystery to the train!’_

He takes another look at his hand before he moves into the next train car. 

Though the door, he finds himself in a forest of giant mushrooms. Any sky above him is blocked by the gills of the tallest mushrooms, but the path is lit by bioluminescent fungi that give off soft blue and green glows. Some, which are taller than Stanford, give off a bright enough light that remind him of old style street lamps. The sight is absolutely stunning. 

From behind a stalk, a familiar sight walks into his field of vision. A gnome, whose cap is a tall red mushroom cap, instead of the typical red fabric hat, wanders into his sight. 

“Hello!” he calls out, jogging up to the gnome. 

The gnome turns around to look at him, rather than just running away like most gnomes do to strangers in Gravity Falls. 

“You’re a gnome, yes?” 

“..yes.” the gnome says, warily. 

Stanford opens his journal again, opening to a new page. “Have you ever heard of a place called Gravity Falls, by chance?” 

“No..?” The gnome looks at him, confused.

“Interesting, would you mind if I measure you?” Ford asks, writing down information already.

The gnome looks disturbed by him and scampers off.

Oh well.

 _'Train Gnomes'_ he writes _'the train has gnomes! Nearly identical to the gnomes of Gravity Falls, these gnomes might have ancestral links to ones in Gravity Falls.’_

How did they get on the train? Unless the train was in Gravity Falls before. 

_'I am suspecting that the train might’ve been in Gravity Falls before. Perhaps the train was what caused the Great Train Crash of '83?’_

Oh to think what a train like this could implicate for his unified theory of weirdness! Perhaps all the other creatures he’s met on the train originate from different planes of existence, and the train acts as a mode of transportation for the creatures! An interplanetary mode of migration for entirely new kinds of species to migrate to and from different worlds. 

Perhaps it’s a link to the “weirdness dimension” that Bill spoke of? But then, that begs a few questions. 

Why hasn’t Bill mentioned the train? 

He quickly rations that Bill simply didn’t want him to become distracted with the train when he could be building the portal. It was already overwhelming him, he might’ve chosen the easy way to the answer, rather than taking the time to create a better solution. It would make sense, seeing as trains nowadays are seen as slow and outdated means of transportation even by humans.

The other question is, how long will it take to loop back around to Gravity Falls? Or Earth for that matter? 

Getting to the front of the train just became more important than investigating the gnomes. 

8 hours of the train and he’s only been through a couple dozen train cars. He couldn’t see the front of the train, and he has been making slow progress through the cars, at the rate he’s been going, he’ll be an old man before reaching the front. 

No more distractions, then. 

He closes the journal and puts it in his inner jacket pocket. As he does, he notices that his number has gone down. 

“It went down?” he asks no-one. 

Or, he thought he asked no-one. 

“The number on your hand?” a voice comes out of nowhere. 

He turns around and sees it, a gnome on a mushroom slightly taller than Stanford. He looks very similar to a specific gnome he knew in Gravity Falls. 

“Shmebulock Senior?” Ford asks, feeling confused and surprised.

“Ah, so we’ve met in your dimension.” Shmebulock Senior says. “I can only imagine by the look on your face that you’ve never met me when I’m able to speak.”

Ford is thrown for a moment, trying to understand the implications of what he just said. “Are you saying that you’re not usually able to speak? That the other you-“ the gibberish his Shmebulock wrote in his journal. Well that’s something to try to decode- _later,_ he reminds himself. He needs to focus. Train. Number on hand. This Shmebulock.

Right.

“No, sorry, not the right time. What do you know about the number on my hand?” as he lifts his hand to show it to Shmebulock, he notices that it’s going down again.

“It’s a good thing that it’s going down, that’s for sure. The other passengers on the train all have one.” Shmebulock stops to give Stanford a high five. “I couldn’t keep you hanging.” 

“It’s a good thing it’s going down? How? What is the number?” Ford asks, retracting his hand from Shmebulock. 

“It tells you how close you are to getting off the train. The Train will let you off once you’re ready to get off.” Shmebulock answers.

“But why does it go up? I’ve been heading in one direction this whole time!” Ford protests. 

“Enough questions, this chapter of your story wasn’t supposed to have me in it in the first place.” He looks at something, like he’s seeing something there, then turns around and climbs mushrooms up to jump onto higher mushrooms. 

“No, wait!” Ford calls, but Shmebulock climbs out of sight. 

Ford sighs, which becomes an almost-growl of frustration. He didn’t get many answers. 

The number tells him how close he is to getting off the train? He’s been heading in one direction the whole time, is the train growing? But he had said that the train will let him off when he’s ready. Does it think that he doesn’t want to get off? Well, he never said he wanted to get off the train, he just wanted to get to the front of the train. Does he want to get off the train? 

Apparently the number thinks he does. 

The number comes from the train, so does that mean the train is aware? Is it psychic? 

But why had the number gone up? Thinking back to the times he remembers the number changing, he doesn’t remember becoming more or less interested in leaving. He made it a goal on the second train car that he wanted to get to the front. 

He decides that whenever he notices it changing, he’ll write down what he was doing and thinking when it happened. That will get him actual data he can work with.

With that settled, he moves on. 

Deeper in the forest, he finds a puzzle that has him sorting mushrooms by color and shape onto a line of stones that would glow green under the light of the mushrooms when he placed them in the correct order. 

The door clicks unlocked and he moves on to the next train car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright so Comic Con is coming up and I'm planning on cosplaying, plus I'm also getting my wisdom teeth removed Wednesday, so basically I'mma go write in advance so I don't start this fic off with a hiatus right from the beginning.
> 
> Tell me things in the comments or come yell at me on Tumblr! Even if it's just a smiley face or a quote you liked! Comments > kutos!! <3
> 
> Even if this fic is old, for real, I love comments.


	3. The Duck Car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stanford becomes frustrated at the lack of progress.

A week passes.

A whole week passes with no change whatsoever.

It’s really aggravating Stanford at this point.

He’s gone through at least two hundred train cars by now, running through as many as fast as he could until his daily car average came to thirty five cars. Some days he couldn’t make it to thirty five, getting stuck in a train car with a locked door and an inane unlocking mechanism. One day he had gone through eight cars before getting stopped for the whole day in a car that seemingly didn’t _have_ a puzzle at all! The door had simply unlocked after 6 hours of being in the car, without Stanford doing anything.

Not only is he being slowed for no reason, his number hasn’t changed since he met Shmebulock! He hasn’t been able to ask anyone about it, either. Anyone he tries to ask either doesn’t know about the number or what he needs to do to lower it, or they don’t even know they’re on a train to begin with!

It’s his unified theory of weirdness all over again.

Except worse because he hasn’t been able to contact Bill once from the train.

He’s not sure if Bill simply isn’t responding like he tended to do occasionally, or if he’s cut off from Bill entirely from this space.

He’s completely lost and has no idea what he needs to do.

At least some of the cars supply him with necessities. He hadn’t gone onto the train with a toothbrush or much food, so he is extremely grateful for getting some supplies in the hotel train car, whose doors were at the main lobby door and the roof entrance respectively.

He’s still sour that the elevator could only be fixed at the top floor.

Currently, he’s sending frogs across a swamp on paths of lily pads. He could just walk them across, but they jump out of his hands and swim back to the start if he does that.

The lily pads all have different flowers, colors, and pad shapes, and the frogs have patterns on their backs to match a color, flower, or pad shape, and Ford has to send the frogs on the matching path in order to get the frogs across. The frogs refuse to jump onto lily pads that don’t match them, and so Ford has to check the path thoroughly before setting them on their ways. If he sets them on the wrong path, they slowly jump on every different pad they could land on for a few minutes until Ford picked them up and put them on another path.

It’s a stupid puzzle.

He likes puzzles, normally! It’s just, this puzzle feels like a cheap child diner placemat game.

‘Match the frogs to the lily pad paths!’

G-d strike him down now.

Finally, the last frog is across and the door unlocks, he walks through the sludge back to the door, thoroughly soaked in swamp water and mud.

To say the least, he’s frustrated. He’s frustrated that there’s no reason behind the train, as far as he can tell.

He hates not knowing.

Looking beyond the guard rail, he feels frustration building further. In the week he’s been here, the scenery hasn’t changed either. The bleak, drought ridden land barren except for a few dry trees. He would get off the train, but he’s seen the land be struck by the strange light a few too many times to think that it’s even moderately safe. Now, if he put together some kind of shock resistant rubber suit then he might try it, but there hasn’t been any material in any of the train cars that he could use.

Going across the bridge to the next car, he opens the door only to find the car absolutely full of ducks.

“What the hell!? Why!?” He doesn’t slam the door shut, he just yells at the train car. “This is stupid! I hate this! I love mystery but I hate this!”

The ducks in front of the door go quiet and stare at him.

“Nothing in all my years infuriates me as much as this! Why!? Why ducks!? Why any of this!? Why can’t I figure it out!? Everything in the universe has reason behind it’s existence. Evolution evolved birds different beaks to be able to eat different food, evolution gave cats retractable claws to protect them when they’re not being used, even the gnomes help stabilize Gravity Falls' ecosystem! There’s no reason for THIS!” he screams in frustration, taking a large gasping breath after his rant.

The ducks climb over each other to get away from the door.

He stomps over to the guard rail, throwing his hands out.

“The whole train doesn’t make any sense! What is it’s purpose!? It hasn’t stopped to let creatures migrate, it doesn’t even seem to go anywhere! Why am I-”

“It just doesn’t make Any. SENSE!” He slams his fist down onto the guard rail.

His hand throbs in pain.

“Ow! Why did I-“ He looks down at his hand, his words tapering off.

His number is going up.

Not just by a few, or ten.

Its gone up sixty points.

“AND THIS! THE DAMN NUMBER DOESN’T MAKE SENSE! NOTHING MAKES SENSE!” he grips his wrist in his other hand, yelling at it.

He feels insane.

Maybe he is.

It just-

“Wait, wait, I need-“ in a moment of clarity, he remembers that he needed to write down everything that happens with his number. He pulls out his journal, flipping back to the page on his number on his hand.

 _I got angry-_ an understatement- _I began ranting to myself-_ a small lie- because of confounding nature of the train. _I just can’t figure it out! ~~I feel so lost.~~ _ He crosses out the last part, lying to himself. _It’s raised so much more than any other time, it’s gone from 235 to_ He looks at his number again, and notices it still rising.

The train lurches to a stop, the bright light coming to take another passenger.

“Enough!” he stands, not waiting for the number to stop moving. He doesn’t want to stay on the train, anymore. Safety be damned, he’s getting off _now._ he climbs off the train car, the ducks watching him as he climbs down. He jumps at the end of the ladder, rolling when he hits the ground.

He inspects the dirt, the ground feeling like normal hardened clay and sandstone of Earth's deserts. Just on time, the lightning strikes the tree directly under the swarming storm clouds. He wants to inspect the tree.

Running towards the area of impact, his leg gets caught in the mud surrounding the tree.

“What the? Mud? Is the water in the mud attracting the lightning? Or is the mud growing the tree that attracts the lightning?” He looks at the tree, seeing that it’s undamaged as far as he can tell. “Interesting.” Before he could move towards it, he heard the sound of dirt shifting.

Beneath the tree, a cockroach like creature crawls from under the ground. The blattidae is about the size of a medium sized dog, and has two legs rather than six. What appears to be it’s face turns towards him, it hisses at him, it’s mouth full of teeth. Stanford pulls his leg out of the mud, walking backwards. Two more of the creatures crawl out of the dirt, outnumbering him.

He hears the train's whistle blow, the breaks releasing their tension behind him.

He makes a break for it.

The creatures give chase, their cicada like chirping loud in his ears.

He shouldn’t have gotten off the train.

Up ahead, the train starts moving, the wheels creaking as the axils start them turning again. If he doesn’t get on soon, the train will get too fast for him to jump onto it. He can’t wait for the train to stop again, he won’t be able to out run the creatures following after him.

There are many creatures in Gravity Falls that cannot be outrun, the Kill billies, soothsquitos, and Steve, to name a few. But each of them have a way to escape from them. Kill Billies cannot go into convenience stores, soothsquitos don’t like big spray, Steve will do anything to keep you from seeing his face. These things are unknowns but maybe since hes never seen them on the train they won’t come on the train with him.

He gets to a wheel that’s still turning slowly and leaps onto it, holding on until he can reach the ladder above it. He pulls himself up and starts climbing. The buzzing in his ears hasn’t stopped, and when he looks down, he sees that the creatures have sprouted wings from beneath their exoskeletons. They chase him up the ladder, he pushes his body to it’s limit to climb faster than they can climb.

He rushes to the nearest door, rushing to open it. The creatures are right behind him as he rushes in, slamming the door on one but letting another in the train car with him.

The creature jumps at him, knocking him down to the ground with a thud against the strange ground. He wrestles with the creature, grabbing it by it’s front legs and flipping it onto it’s side. He lifts up his right leg and kicks it away from him, scrambling to get up and away from it.

He’s not in the duck car, rather, he’s in a jungle. He races into the trees, the vines and moss hanging down getting in his way and hopefully slowing down the creature. He gets a few yards before the creature knocks him down from behind, he yells as they crash to the ground, rolling down a small hill. The creature is on top of him and before he can wrestle with it, it opens it’s mouth, the inky blackness reveling a mouth full of teeth.

He feels his ears pop and suddenly feels like he’s dying.

He feels like he cant breathe, yet when he yells in pain, he hears himself. He wants the sensation to stop, but he can’t seem to move his body, it’s like all strength has left his body.

He feels himself starting to lose consciousness, the jungle going dark around him, his yells becoming quieter. It becomes harder to stay awake, and he thinks that he’s finally met with his doom, despite Bill telling him that he wouldn’t die for a very long time. His eyelids close, his eyes rolling to the back of his head despite his desperate commands for his body to stay awake.

His ears pop again, the weight suddenly off his chest. He gasps, his strength returning to him enough to push himself up into a sitting position. His eyes open and he sees his savior, standing above him in a pose he’s seen many times before when he would be protected from his childhood bullies. He leaps onto the creature, holding it to the ground with his knee as he repeatedly punches it. Ford is still dazed as he watches this, stunned by the sight before him. The creature eventually stops, going still under the punishment of the brass knuckles brutalizing it.

The man sits triumphant over the creature, panting from the exertion.

The man in the red jacket turns towards him, and Ford feels the breath knocked out of him.

_“Stan?!”_

__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have some art of Ford reacting to the Duck Car and idk how to include it in the chapter or if that's something anyone would like.
> 
> Tell me things in the comments or come yell at me on Tumblr! Even if it's just a smiley face or a quote you liked! Comments > kutos!! <3
> 
> Even if this fic is old, for real, I love comments.


	4. Escapism pt 2: REST

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stan's day isn't going well.

Stan is having an awful birthday, to be frank. Not his worst, though, his worst had been in 1976, which landed him in a place worse than even a Columbian prison: a mental ward. No, this birthday had been going poorly, but not as poorly as that had, but the night was still young, as they say. 

Currently, he was running from his old Columbian prison cellmate and ex “employer” Rico. More specifically, he was running from his goons. Rico didn’t chase people very often, he had men to do that for him. He had once been one of those men for a short time before Rico caught on that he wasn’t just not catching the people he was chasing, but actively helping them get away. If Rico got ahold of those people, they wouldn’t see the light of day unless they had something Rico wanted, and if they survived by the time the sun was out, they would be wishing they were dead. 

To say the least, he didn’t want to get caught. But the blood seeping sluggishly through his shirt had other plans. He couldn’t keep running forever, and the amount of time he could run was starting to run out as each step sent harsh pain through his side and more blood out the wound. He was applying pressure as much as he could, but doing so while trying to run was difficult. Every time he stumbled a bit too much, any clot that he managed to get would get dislodged and start bleeding again. 

He needed to get somewhere safe to patch himself up. Somewhere far away where he could take a look at the wound and dress it properly. He just needed to keep running until he was safe.

But the blood loss and exhaustion were taking their toll and Stan felt the trees swaying with the ground beneath his feet. He couldn’t stop now, if he did they would catch up to him. He stumbles into a tree, the tall oak catching him by the shoulder. He pushes himself off, using the tree to balance himself. He gets a few more feet before he body checks another tree. His breathing is labored as he leans against the tree for a moment before stumbling off to another. He’s leaving behind a very obvious path for the people following him, but if he didn’t use the trees, he wouldn’t be able to move forward. 

Finally he leans against a tall cottonwood and slides down to it’s base. He rolls over to a sitting position against the tree. He needs to keep going, but he hurts so much. His side isn’t the only thing hurting, his heart and his head both feel heavy. He wants to just sit down and sleep. Hopefully he’ll just bleed out before Rico’s men can find him, preferring to die now rather than die by Rico’s hand. 

Today wasn’t going great. 

All he wanted to do was drink himself into a little coma until the end of today, can’t he just have that? Why can’t he have just a little bit of privacy for his self loathing? He wasn’t planning anything like what happened in 76, he just wanted a little oblivion to make the day go by faster.

Oh but Rico decided to track him down today of all days. When Stan was on his third shot of tequila in his motel of all times. Then he had to wrestle with the goons and hightail it out of there. Unfortunately one of them had a knife which was completely unfair. He had sliced at Stan, who managed to dodge the first attack and catch the goon's arm after the second one. The problem was in the second one, of course, which had done a bit more than just graze his left side. He wasn’t stabbed, which was nice, but it stung like a bitch. 

He peeked down at the wound. It looks okay, and isn’t as life threatening as he thought it was. Which sucks for him because he can hear the goons coming closer. He had some distance from them, but that doesn’t matter much when you stop to count tweetie birds floating around your head. 

He doesn’t want to die, he just can’t stand being awake anymore. He would like some rest from everything that’s happened these past few years. He just wants his rest; it’s why he drank, drinking let him sleep for longer periods of time and in the middle of the day. It kept him from doing anything and kept him from thinking too hard. He still felt sad, but at least he didn’t have so much awareness. If he was drunk enough, he wouldn’t be able to notice where he was, which was more depressing than his current situation was sometimes. Dingy motels and shady streets were his home now, the ex cons and parolees his people.

He misses home, his real home, wherever that was- not New Jersey, he never planned on staying there. He missed his family, the people who raised him and loved him- not his Pa, who had kicked him out; but maybe his Pa when he was just a kid, when he had been kinder. But he missed Ford the most. Maybe his home was there, with him. Maybe it was another thing that was left with Ford when Stan was kicked out.

He closed his eyes, wanting to sleep.

A bright green light appears before him. 

His eyes open to see a train slowing to a stop before him. Had the tracks been there the whole time? He hadn’t noticed. The train stops, the door opening right in front of him.

The plate above the door flips to read **“REST”**

He pushes himself up, leaning against the tree. Behind him he hears Rico’s goons yelling back and forth to each other. They haven’t given up yet. They don’t mention anything about the train, which is odd. Maybe it’s an illusion. He takes a shaky step towards the train, then another, before looking back at the base of the tree. He doesn’t see himself, which he was thinking might’ve been the case if this was him dying. The train is definitely not normal, but seems real enough. 

He steps up to the train, using the hand rail to pull himself up the stairs. A bright light blinds him.

He hopes that whatever rest the train offers is better than the rest Rico could eventually give him.

-

He wakes up. He doesn’t move as he takes in information. He gently curls his toes and fingers, then twists his forearms and rolls his ankles. He notices that his side doesn’t hurt anymore, and that he doesn’t seem to be tied up or anything. He’s lying on his back, the ground below him is that texture of sharp but also soft that can only be leaves. 

He peeks one eye open, then the other as he notices the change in scenery. He was in New Mexico, Northeast of Taos, but now he’s decidedly not. The terrain isn’t like New Mexico, which isn’t the complete desert wasteland most people think. The tall cottonwood trees had nothing of the redwood of California, but they still provided a canopy over the shady forest. Here, a canopy looms over him, the bright oranges glow with the light of the sun, but even though he’s completely shaded, the air here is thick and hot, completely opposite to the cool and light mountain air of New Mexico. He’s not where he was, for sure. 

The question is: where is he? 

He looks around, the forest goes on as far as his eyes can see, but nothing gives him any information. There aren’t any paths or signs anywhere, and no-one but him that he can tell. He remembers the gash, which he checks now that he thinks he’s relatively safe; but when he lifts his shirt, he finds that it’s missing. The skin isn’t even pink like a new scar. There aren’t stitches, no blood, just the skin of his stomach, like it never happened.

Is he dreaming? He could be, but he’s never had dreams this vivid before. He could be dead, but it’s so quiet and his body still has it’s old aches and scars, which doesn’t make sense. Did that train take him somewhere? It was definitely some kind of weird thing like the Jersey Devil and Bigfoot. Aliens, maybe. Ford had always believed in them, maybe they were real after all and he was just probed or something, then plopped back wherever on Earth he was. 

He stands up, knowing he would never get anything from sitting here all day. He doesn’t see anything interesting or different in any direction, so after finding the general direction of the sun, he went towards it. He would eventually find someone or something, hopefully a stream so he could follow that, instead. 

After ten minutes of walking, he sees a buck in the distance, he gives it a wide berth, not wanting to scare it. 

A few minutes later he hears something and looks behind himself, another buck there. He makes his steps light to avoid spooking it. 

A few more minutes and he realizes that the buck is following him. 

He doesn’t know what to do. What do dears eat? They don’t eat meat, do they? He thinks they’re vegetarian, but it still doesn’t help him in knowing what to do.

He starts sweating anxiously, nervous and confused, adding to the sweat already starting to make his shirt collar stick to him. 

What the hell is up with this deer!? 

He tries kicking at the leaves, making more noise to hopefully scare it away, but every time he turns around the deer is still there, following after him. He starts speed walking, hoping to lose him, but when he looks back, the deer is closer than he had been. It’s more than just matching his speed, it’s catching up to him. He really doesn’t want to try to outrun a deer, so he instead takes a sharp turn next to a large tree. It keeps following him. The deer is getting closer.

He watches behind him, and yells wordlessly at it. It keeps following him, getting closer. 

“Hey deer! What’s your problem!?” he yells at it. It keeps following him. Getting closer. 

“Stop following me!” he yells, keeping his eyes on it as he keeps walking. It keeps following. Only a few yards away. Coming closer. 

Stan runs into something, landing back on his ass. He turns around and the deer is gone. It’s nowhere in sight as he frantically looks around. He turns back around and before his eyes, the cause of his bruised backside. 

A bright red door connected to nothing. He stands up, brushing the leaves from his clothes. 

What is this?

There’s no knob, just the weird gold colored symbol on the front. He looks closer, the gold thing comes off the door a solid inch, and has a seam that disconnects it from the door. He takes hold of it and twists. The symbol flips 180° and the door opens. Through the door, a platform is connected to another by a bridge, a door identical to the one he just opened is opposite to him. Out to each side, a dry and barren landscape goes out for miles. The sound of train wheels on metal rails reaches his ears, the sound telling him what he didn’t want to hear.

He’s still on the train. 

He looks around, the forest looking just like Earth’s. 

Is this a zoo? 

Is he on a weird zoo? 

He leaves the train car, and looks out to the wasteland, hoping for anything that might get him home. He looks for the front of the train, the wind blowing his hair behind him. He doesn’t see the front, the trains going and going until he can’t see anything further. He looks to the back of the train, using his hands to pull back his hair as it tries to get in his face. When he does, even his horrible eyes can’t ignore the glowing green in the palm of his hand.

He pulls his hand down to look at it. There are numbers written on his hand, glowing a bright white and surrounded in green. Squinting, he can make out the numbers.

_97_

Did they brand him?! It didn’t feel burned, which is a first, so maybe they used some alien technology to do it. 

Those assholes. He ought to give them a knuckle sandwich, but with how advanced they are, he probably wouldn’t stand a chance. He decides to go back. He saw train cars behind the one he had woken up in, there should be a door somewhere that leads to the next train. He’ll get off through the back, that’s how he escaped George and it’s how he’ll escape the train. Maybe the train is still going through his world through some kind of portal. 

After an hour or so, he finds it, and rushes over to the next train car. He’ll get out of here. He will survive. 

-

As the days go by, he finds himself getting in better shape than he had been since he was kicked out. Funny thing, the train feeds him better than any soup kitchen or food pantry or government funded program ever did. His gut goes back to it’s boxing shape, more muscle and less beer fat. His skin stops looking so grey, his hair and face less oily. He can breathe better than he had in his entire life- not even when he was a child had he been able to breathe like he could now, his mother smoked three packs a day. 

He feels so good, it tampers his frustration. 

He is frustrated, of course. No matter how far he goes, he still can’t see the end of the train. He still wants off, but he’s starting to question if he should. Life on the rails isn’t too bad, he gets food, water, clothing, an occasional shower, and more importantly rest. As far as he knows, Rico isn’t on the train, nobody is looking for him here, and he’s not in danger. Well, mostly, anyway, there have been a few dangerous things on the train, but he hasn’t actually been hurt aside from a few scrapes or bruises from being tossed around by some game or puzzle, so he wonders if any of the cars would actually hurt him. 

Since he’s been going backwards, he’s met a few other passengers, all of them going to the front and not following him even when he tries to convince them to. The passengers all have numbers, a few lower and a lot with higher numbers than him. He met one guy with a 3 on his hand, he was very calm and had talked about how he had started with a very high number, but it started going down when he started working through some things. Stan had written him off as a hippy before meeting Magalia and her little group of bullies.

The lady had numbers all up her arm. She was angry, rude, and a sadist. He had been walking, minding his own business, when he heard something screaming. The picture wasn’t pretty, and as it turned out, they had been kicking the miniature town over and throwing the townspeople as hard as they could. 

He had beat their asses pretty good and hard, chasing them out of the car and blockading the door shut. He helped the villagers bury their dead- a lot easier when you’re well over six times their size- and rebuild their village. They thanked him for everything he did and did anything they could, which ended up being mending his clothing by weaving strings they made into the fabric, mending holes and worn out spots seamlessly. 

He left that car thinking that maybe the hippy was right.

He had seen his number go up and down over the course of the week he was there, but after making that connection, he paid close attention to when it went down. 

Then he met Mirror Stan. 

He had told him so much, and it solidified his resolve to get off the train. 

He’s going through a jungle style train car when he hears a scream of pain that’s too familiar for him. He runs to the noise, putting his knuckle dusters on as he runs and when he enters the clearing, he feels the air get punched out of his lungs. _It’s Ford,_ his brain connects immediately, his twin is under that thing and it’s hurting him.

It’s not even a second later that he feels a fiery protective aggression overtake him, launching him forward and into the monster. _Ford. Ford is here and in pain and he needs needs **needs** to help him._ He doesn’t think about what he’s doing, just punching the thing that had been attacking his brother. He only stops when the thing stops moving. He stands up and turns around, his brother sitting up with his arms supporting him from behind. 

Ford looks good, his body filled out and less lanky than the last time he had seen him. He was sweaty, but has a healthy complexion. His trenchcoat, which fits him to a T, has mud and dirt all over it, there are scratches on his face and sticks and leaves in his hair, but otherwise he looks like himself. 

“Stan?!” his brother chokes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you, thank you!! All y'all have been so nice to me and it made me produce a nice THREE THOUSAND WORDS! I'm gonna try for writing these longer chapters, which will be interesting to produce every week while I'm going to school, but I'll manage it. 
> 
> Also, if you guys draw any art for the fic, (idk why you would but good on you!) you can @ me @ArtisticArteriesArt on Tumblr with the tag #InfinityFalls . I'm gonna be cross posting the chapters on there, I think, or at least linking the chapters with little teasers with them. I'll also see if I could maybe figure out how to embed images and put them in the fic (with permission and proper tagging, of course.)


	5. The Jungle Car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stan and Ford reunite for the first time after eight years of being apart.
> 
> Ford makes a decision.

Stanley stands tall in front of Stanford, panting from his fight with the beast. Sweat making his skin shiny as it reflects the light of the train car’s sun. His clothes look clean and new, and his hair looks washed. He seems to be doing well for himself, at least. Ford shakes the thought out of his mind, refocusing on the issue at hand instead of something that wasn’t his problem anymore. 

“How are you here?! Why are you here?!” Ford balks. Of all things he would have thought he’d see on the train, Stan was _never_ one of them. He hadn’t thought he’d ever see Stan again at all, let alone on the train of all places.

“How am _I_ here? How are _you_ here?” Stan shoots back. Stan gestures to Ford, and Ford is able to see a number in the double digits on his hand, he didn’t get a good glimpse, but it looked to be between 19 and 10. “I thought you were in Oregon doing research or something!” 

“I was- wait, how do you know I was in Oregon?” Ford asks, thrown. 

“Ma told me last time I called her.”

“Mom told you!? Ugh” he presses his hand to his face in exasperation, Stan hurries to kneel in front of him, his hands hovering in front of him as if he wants to check Ford over but doesn’t know if he’s okay to do so.

“Are your okay? Are you hurt?”

**_14_ **

“She had no right telling you about me.” Ford growls.

**106**

Stan takes his hand back like he was hit. 

He sees Stan hesitate, swallowing and reining in his emotions before replying. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Stan asks, his voice sounding intentionally flat.

Ford gives him a look. Stan’s shoulders slump and Ford stands, dusting off his clothes. Stan turns his head down. 

**113**

Neither speak for a moment, before Stan speaks in a quiet voice, without looking up at him. Ford doesn’t make out what he said.

“What did you say?”

Stan looks up at him, his eyebrows furrowed in a hurt confusion. 

“You aren’t even going to thank me?” he asks slowly, like he’s genuinely asking.

**_12_**

Stan is searching his eyes, watching his face with a fervor that suggests he’s desperately looking for something. 

“Thank you? For what, costing me my dream school?!” Ford asks incredulously. Stan’s eyes widen in surprise before hardening in hurt and anger.

**120**

“For saving your life! Doesn’t that, I don’t know, make up for an accident that happened 8 years ago!?” Stan yells “Do you really hate me so much that you wouldn’t even thank the person who rushed in to save you?” 

“An accident?” Ford shouts back “That was no accident Stanley! You sabotaged my project because you couldn’t bear seeing me actually do something with my life!” 

**128**

“Why is it so hard for you to believe that it was an accident?” Stan bellows back, his fists balled up tightly at his waist. His expression angry and hurt, before it suddenly changes, his face going through multiple emotions in a quick fire succession before he continues in a softer voice: “..why is it so easy for you to believe I would try to hurt you?” 

**_10_ **

Ford stands there, shocked into wordlessness. He decidedly continues to stand firm in his resolve; regardless of not knowing what to say.

**150**

The twins stare at each other silently for a long moment. The jungle sounds slowly resuming around them, exactly when they had stopped had been unnoticed by both during their yelling match.

Stan huffs, looking back to the ground. He stands, looking up at Ford one more time. He searches his eyes again, before closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. 

“Fine. Okay? Just fine.” Stan says, turning away from him. “If you really feel like that, then.. maybe Ma’s the only family I have left.” 

_**23** _

With that, Stan shoves his hands in his pockets and walks off in the direction of the door, heading towards the back of the train. 

Ford watches him leave for a single minute before he leaves in the opposite direction. 

**163**

Ford walks away, taking long angry strides to get away from the source of his ire faster. The jungle is completely background noise, Ford barely noticing it as his angry thoughts consume him like flames consuming a piece of paper; hot, quick, and without mercy. After all that time, Stan hasn’t changed at all, he’s still the selfish brute that he was when he sabotaged his project. Why would Ford want to do anything with him? Stan may need Ford to get anywhere, but Ford certainly didn’t need Stan. 

The jungle wasn’t the only thing Ford was oblivious to because of the heat of his anger.

He also didn’t notice that with each step he took, his number rose. 

Finding the door, he leaves his past behind him. He strides to the next train car and continues on. His anger continues to consume him as he goes through the motions of getting through the train. Enter, find and solve the puzzle, move on to the next car. Just as repetitive as his actions, his thoughts make loops in his mind. _How could he, he ruined my life, **I don’t need him.**_

__

_**Good riddance.** _

_What are you doing?! Go back!_

He pauses, confused where that thought came from. 

_Down here._

He looks down and is met with his reflection. It isn’t reflecting him perfectly, and is instead on his hands and knees. 

“Oh!” Ford says, sidetracked. “That’s peculiar, are you-“ 

“That’s not important!” his reflection interrupts him “You just got him back, why aren't you with him?!” 

“What?” Ford asks, thrown. 

“Stan! You can’t just leave like that! We just got them back!” his reflection looks upset, yelling at Ford from below him.

“What are you talking about?! Stan betrayed me!” He snaps, yelling. “Why would I want anything to do with him?”

“Because he’s your twin!” he argues.

“Some brother he’s turned out to be.” Ford replies coldly.

His reflection pushes himself up, moving to the closest pillar and reflecting off it instead of the floor. He stands up to his full height and pounds his fist against the wall separating them. 

“I can’t believe you.” He hisses at Ford. “Can’t you at least see that _I_ want to see them?!” He yells, his hands coming to his chest, gesturing to himself in example. “We both miss our twins but at least I can admit it! But I have no choice, because I’m attached to you!” He yells.

“I don’t-” 

“Yes you do!” he interrupts, again. “Why do you think you like the lake so much? Or why going home is so hard for you?” 

Ford goes to reply, but the reflection cuts him off with a look. 

He doesn’t miss Stan. Why would he? He was too angry at him to miss him. You couldn’t miss someone you were angry with. 

Instead, Ford changed the topic.

“You said you don’t have a choice, that you were attached to me, what did you mean?” 

His reflection sighs, looking down and away from Ford. “As a reflection, I’m bound to reflect you for your entire life. So while you pretend not to miss your Stan, I’m forcibly kept away from my Stan. You thought you felt like you didn’t have any autonomy? Imagine what it’s like to be a reflection. You don’t have a choice in anything. I have to follow you wherever you go, do whatever you do, and say whatever you say.”

“You miss your Stan?” Ford quietly asks.

**158**

His reflection closes his eyes, putting his forehead to the glass. “Reflections don’t have friends. Whenever we’re with others, we’re just reflecting what our prime say and do.” He opens his eyes and looks up at Ford, smiling. “But do you realize how amazing it was for you and Stan to spend so much time at the beach? We could reflect you, but the water obscured what we were actually saying. Meaning we could have actual conversations for hours at a time without either of you noticing!” he pauses, before his smile shifts to a glare. “But then you had to ruin it, didn’t you?” 

“Me?” Ford sputters, “I didn’t ruin anything! Stan did!” 

“You decided that West Coast Tech was more important than your family! You were leaving him!” his reflection accuses, tapping his pointer finger at the glass angrily. 

“I wanted to-“ he starts

“You wanted to be a great science figure, beloved by all and remembered along with great men of science like Tesla and Einstein. I know. But do you realize how selfish that is? How self centered?” he proclaims. 

“I’m not selfish! Stan was!” he interrupts.

“You cared more about a chance to be revered than your own family!” He yells again. “Do you remember back in highschool, you had been beaten up and tossed into a closet, they wrote freak on your forehead and just left you in there?” 

Ford nods

“Stan found you, and you asked if he didn’t have friends because of you. He told you that even if he was popular, and had everything that came with it, that he would still give it up to be your brother. Or remember when he ditched his date to dance with you at prom? Again and again he proved his loyalty to you, his selflessness, and you can’t even stand up for him when your principal is saying he won’t attest to anything in life? Or when your dad kicked him out? You didn’t even thank him when he saved your life!” 

“I-“ he interrupts himself, unsure what to say.

The reflection watches him angrily, “Fine. If you won’t admit that you miss him, at least get me out of here.” 

Ford looks up at him in surprise “Get out? How?” 

“This car is the gate between our worlds.” The reflection explains, “I’m supposed to help you open the door by switching with you and then switching back to let you pass, but I think we might be able to get me out without trapping you by giving me something to reflect myself from, like an endless loop of mirrors.” 

“Oh!” he pays down his pockets for a moment, thinking about what he had that could be used. He frowns. “I don’t have anything reflective enough.” 

The reflection looks to ponder for a moment before his head snaps up with a broad smile. “The Journal!”

“The Journal?” Ford asks, confused. 

“The gold handprint you put on the cover, it’s reflective enough for me to reflect from it.” He explains. 

“You’re sure?” Ford doesn’t want to take the gold foil off the front for nothing, it might tear the book's cover.

“Yes, I’ve reflected off it before.” 

“Oh, I see.” Ford pulls out his journal from within his coat pocket, the gold foil glimmering around the number 3 he wrote on top of it. He scratches at the sides until they start coming off. It takes some time, but eventually he gets the foil off in mostly one piece, the thumb coming off as he tries to peel it off. He lifts the hand silhouette up to the pillar, the reflective side pointing out to the Reflection Ford. The reflection puts his palm to the foil and pushes out of the pillar from the point of double reflection of the two reflective surfaces meeting. He steps out and clenches his hand around the foil. Ford letting go as he does so. 

“It worked.” The reflection says, looking down at his left hand, the palm of which was covered in gold foil. “I’m out.” 

He looks up at Ford, smiling at him for a moment before the smile fades away from his face. He sighs. “Thank you.”

Ford’s eyes widen in surprise, confused why he would be thanking him.

The reflection rolls his eyes. “What? I’m trying not to be like you, okay? That means thanking people when they do something nice, and admitting to myself that I miss my brother. I’m going to find Stan, you’re free to come with, or not.” 

Ford averts his eyes to the floor.

He hears the reflection sigh sadly, a twinge of disappointment coloring his tone. “Don’t stay in here long, the- nevermind.. just, don’t stay here long.” He says, before running out the door.

Ford hears the door slide shut. He stands there, alone, without even his reflection in a world of mirrors. 

**160**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow this chapter was kind of a mess. I like, wrote part of it, then was unhappy with how it was going so I went and wrote another part, then went back and tried to fix the first part but didn't change hardly anything. I wanted to make it longer, I did and I tried, but I couldn't find a way to make it longer without adding more plot content, cause that needed to be saved for the next chapter.


	6. The Candy Car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ford has another talk with someone wiser than him.

Ford didn’t miss Stan. He didn’t. He didn’t need to be shackled down again, so he won’t go back to Stan. 

Which is what he repeats to himself again and again as he and his reflection speed walk through the train cars looking for Stan. 

He doesn’t like it, but after his reflection left, he remembered what he had said about the train car. That the door needed to have the reflection and the “prime” switch so they could proceed. This was rather unfortunate, made even more unfortunate by his reflection not coming back until he gets his brother back. Ford tried to convince him, then tried to drag him back, but the reflection was too strong for him to hardly even slow down. So, in order to make sure he comes back to help, Ford goes along with his reflection. 

After they had stopped fighting, a long silence had been poured over them like cement over a coffin. They simply walked quickly through the train cars, the quiet making Ford feel awkward. He opened his mouth to try to break it with a question, but the reflection beat him to it. 

“What will you do when we find Stan?” He asks, “We’ll all go back to the mirror car, and you can’t just ignore him the whole time like you have these last eight years.” The last part has a bite to it, the reflection purposely trying to make him feel bad.

“I don’t have anything to say to him.” Ford mutters lowly. 

The reflection huffs through his teeth, angered. “No, why would you have anything to say to the man who saved your life? It’s not like you’re brothers or were childhood best friends or anything.” 

“He ruined my life!” Ford seethed.

“More than you ruined his?” the reflection retorts.

“What? How did I ruin Stan’s life?! I didn’t do anything!” Ford is taken aback, confused by what he meant by that. Ruin Stan’s life? How had he ruined Stan’s life? If he did anything, it didn’t compare to how many opportunities Ford lost when Stan sabotaged his project.

“Exactly!” he says, stopping to face Ford, pointing a finger into his chest. “You didn’t do anything! Stan got kicked out and you didn’t do anything to help. You just let it happen. More than that, you saw him asking you for help and you left him on the street.” 

“But-“   
“No! Did you even think what his life would be like after getting kicked out?” 

Ford feels stricken, his argument falling apart and his mouth wordless. He didn’t like to think of how Stan was doing. He imagined that Stan had gone on adventuring like they had dreamed of, stealing and selling anything he could get his hands on. But the reflection's words paint a different picture. A picture that’s more unclear and painted in darker tones than the picture Ford had considered. 

The reflection takes his finger from Ford’s chest and straightens. His stance authoritative over Ford. 

“I didn’t want to think about him at all.” Ford mutters. 

“Well you should start.” 

They start walking again. Ford starts thinking. What had his twin been doing in the eight years they had been apart for? He didn’t have much when he left and likely spent the night he was kicked out sleeping in his car. But after that, had he stayed in New Jersey for long? He seemed to be doing well enough when Ford saw him on the train, well built with new, clean clothes on. But who knows how long that’s been for? He might’ve spent weeks or even months living in his car. Ford’s time at Backsupsmore was difficult, but was it as hard as Stan’s time parallel to his first weeks? 

There was also the point of Stan saving him from the creature. While the event was purely coincidental in him happening upon Ford at that moment, and most people would have rescued him if they were in Stan’s shoes, it is still an act deserving thanks. If anyone else had saved him, he would have thanked them, yet he hadn’t. Why? Because he was so angry at him for something that happened years ago? He will admit that he is still hurt over what happened, but couldn’t he be civil with him for two minutes? Perhaps he could thank him, at least. 

They hear a voice in the distance as they enter into another car. They stop, share a look, and start following it. It’s Stan, his voice becoming recognizable as they make their way closer. Closer still, they start to make sense of what he’s saying. 

“—I’m sorry.” Stan says. They share a look, who is he talking to? “It’s alright, you couldn’t do anything, he was being unreasonable. But I didn’t even try! Okay, maybe he’s cooled down a bit, you could catch up with-“ 

The reflection breaks out into a run into the clearing. Ford breaks through the hanging gummy rope vines and sees the scene. The reflection runs down the hill of chocolate to the edge of the orange soda spring where Stan leans over the edge, talking to the liquid. To his reflection, Ford realizes. He watches as the reflection catches Stan’s attention, who startles as he sees him. The reflection drops to his knees to the edge of the lake and bends down over it.

“Ford?! No, Mirror Ford?”   
“Ford! Wait, did you trap Prime Ford in the mirror world?!” They say at the same time. Ford reaches them, stopping a few feet away from them. Stan looks up, and Ford misses what his reflection says to Stan’s reflection as their eyes lock. Ford’s decision to thank Stan suddenly began fighting with his memories of that night. 

Stan is the first to look away, looking back at their reflections. 

“And that worked?!” Stan’s reflection balked. 

“Yes!” his reflection says.

“Okay, wait,” Stan buts in, “how did you get out? I thought you could only swap places.”

“Yes, typically,” his reflection says, tilting his head to Stan, not completely looking up at him. “but we created an infinite loop by making me my own reflection by using a reflective surface to let me reflect myself out into the prime world.” 

“What?” Stan asks, deadpan.

“We cheated by using a mirror against another mirror.” His reflection answers.

“Oh like those times I put Ma’s make-up mirror up against the bathroom mirror?” Stan says, snapping his finger. 

“Oh man, I felt like I was drunk for hours after that.” Stan’s reflection pipes in. His reflection chuckles. 

“I remember how you would sway and slur your words.” Ford can hear the smile in his reflections voice as he speaks; fondness coloring his tone a light and happy shade. “Remember when you tripped and fell? I still can’t believe no one noticed when I helped you up.”

The reflections laugh heartily, and Ford feels pain in his chest. He looks down, away from the sight of the reflections talking and laughing so cheerfully and intimately. 

Stan looks at him, unbeknownst to Ford, with a soft sadness that reeks of bitter acceptance. 

“Anyway,” his reflection finally says, his voice airy and interrupted by residual laughter. “We can let you out, as well but we should move quickly. We don’t want the authorities to notice before we get you out.” 

“The authorities?” Ford asks, snapping to attention.

“Leaving the Mirror World is illegal by Mirror Law, punishable by death.” His reflection says somberly.

“If the Flects find out, they’ll sand reflections like us to dust; all for just wanting to live our own lives!” Stan’s reflection rants.

“Then we gotta go, now.” Stan says. The reflections stand from where they were kneeling, mirroring each other more than they were reflecting Stan or Ford.

Stans reflection moves first, pumping his fist slightly, excited. “Alright! Let’s go!” 

Together, they all run back through the train cars, Ford struggling with his confusing thoughts and feelings surrounding the whole series of events. Love and companionship of his childhood, hurt and anger in his senior year, then eight years of resentment festering inside him while combating the longing nostalgia and homesickness. Now, while he’s still angry, he feels a longing pain from seeing the reflections reunite. He doesn’t know what he wants to do, the path ahead unclear to him.

so he does nothing.

 _‘Exactly!’_ his reflection's words scold him in his mind. _‘You didn’t do anything! Stan got kicked out and you didn’t do anything to help. You just let it happen.’_

 _Should_ he do something this time?

“Hey! So I’ve been calling your brother 'Mirror Stan', do you have a name?” Stan calls out to Ford’s reflection as they run. 

Oh, Ford realizes, he never asked him his name. 

Well now he feels like a jerk.

“Oh, hm.” His reflection says, then is quiet for a moment, before laughing a moment and replying “Chrome Ford is fine! I’m not really a reflection of anyone now!”

They reach the chrome car, Mirror Stan appearing on the floor under them and spinning around to face them, skidding across the floor. He looks around, finding a tall triangle and sliding up the flat wall of it. Chrome Ford runs up to him and hugs the wall separating them. They hold that for a moment before Chrome Ford turns to him.

“Do you have anything else that’s reflective?” He asks. Ford pats down his pockets again, looking for anything. He pulls out his pen, but remembers that the clip had broken off. 

“Here.” Stan says from behind him. Ford turns and sees him from the side as he approaches the reflections. Mirror Stan looks shocked at the item in Stan’s hand. He can’t see it over Stan’s shoulder and can’t tell what it is. He presses it against the wall and Mirror Stan nods to him pointedly and pushes his hand through the wall. 

Just as before, he slowly lets Stan pull him out by the arm until he can help by using his arms. When Stan lets go, Ford sees the brass coloring contrasted against the chrome color of Mirror Stan's hand. There, on the reflections right fist, is one of Stan’s brass knuckles. The metal has smears of black in the civets of the knuckles, the blood of the creature Stan rescued him from had been wiped off, but not completely removed. 

The next moment, Chrome Ford barrels into him with a bear hug. Mirror Stan- or is it Chrome Stan now?- laughs and is shortly joined by Chrome Ford. Their laughter is different than normal laughter, which he realizes is because they’re crying too. Mirror Stan's hug lifts Chrome Ford up off the ground, and he spins them around. 

Ford feels something in his chest twist at the sight, the pain bringing tears to his eyes, but he doesn’t let them fall. 

He realizes then, that he misses Stan. The realization is still combatted against his hurt from that night, but right now it’s much louder than the hurt. 

The two reflections continue to hug for a moment more, before leaning back and looking at each other with wide watery grins. They look back at Stan and Ford, releasing their holds of the other to instead hook their arms around the other’s shoulder; Chrome Ford's left arm over Mirror Stan’s, and Mirror Stan’s right arm over Chrome Ford. The Journal 3 foil shines against Mirror Stan's shoulder and as does Stan’s brass knuckle against Chrome Ford’s. 

“Thank you.” Chrome Ford says, looking at Stan and then to Ford. 

“Where will you two go, now?” Stan asks, his voice sounding off slightly. Ford turns to him, and notices his eyes are watery like his own. 

“I’d like to explore the train, actually.” Chrome Ford smiles to his brother.

“I’m up for some adventure.” Mirror Stan grins. Mirror Stan looks back at them, his eyes lock on Ford and his smile disappears. “What about you, Stan? Do you want to come with us for a bit?” he says, glaring at Ford. 

_‘You didn’t do anything!’_

“actually I was thinking we should stick together, me and Stan, to find a way off the train, I mean.” Ford quickly says, not letting Stan answer.

The three stare at him like he had grown a second head, stunned into silence by his sudden change of heart. Ford himself is stunned by his own words and is also very conflicted by his feelings and thoughts on the matter. Did he want to be near Stan or not? He definitely didn’t know. 

“..Just to get off the train?” Stan asks, like he’s trying to clarify something. 

“I- um. Yes, to get off the train.” He stutters out.“The train is dangerous as well, it would be safer to stick together. I have no doubt you too will be safe?” he redirects to the reflections.

They look at each other for a moment, Chrome Ford mouthing something and nodding. Chrome Ford looks back at the twins.

“I think we can take care of ourselves.” He looks at Ford and nods at him with a small proud smile. Ford relaxes slightly, at least they won’t fight him on it, but what about Stan? He looks back to his twin, who looks to be chewing something over in his mind. Stan nods, barely looking at him as he does. “We should get going, actually, before anyone notices.” Chrome Ford says. 

He and Mirror Stan take their leave, but as Mirror Stan passes by, he bumps him in the shoulder. “Don’t be a jerk anymore.” He says quickly and lowly, glaring distrustfully as he passes by. 

“Oh hey! Wait! We can’t pass through until you help us open the door!” he yells to Chrome Ford. They turn around, Chrome Ford about to answer before Mirror Stan answers instead. 

“The door should open for Stan, since he already did it! Check it!” 

Stan turns and jogs over to the other door, sliding it open easily. 

They wave goodbye, the reflections going out through the back door. He turns to Stan, who’s holding the door open for them to make their own leave. He takes it without word, and together they go on to the next train car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter was a whole day late! I had a very busy weekend followed by me getting an infection. I worked on this chapter most of yesterday and thought about finishing it up and just posting it, but I needed to get some sleep so I did. 
> 
> This chapter was very difficult to write, harder than most of the others, but somehow ended up being over 2300 words, so I'm glad about that at least! Let me know what you guys think, as always!!


	7. The Turtle Car, The Tea Car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The brothers meet some turtles. 
> 
> Ford rethinks his decisions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Early Monday chapter!! I decided to post before school today, cause I have a concert tonight and schoolwork due early tomorrow so I'll be busy later!

Ford has no idea what to do now. From the moment he had invited Stan to come with him so that they could find a way off this train, Ford had felt like he just jumped his car onto a freeway without a map. He felt lost and he didn’t know where to even start, not to mention that he didn’t know what kind of destination he wanted to end at. 

Did he want to make up with Stan? Did he want to just be with him for a while before they go their separate ways? Did he want to go back to Gravity Falls? Or maybe go sailing away forever like they had dreamed of? He didn’t know! All his mind supplied him with were questions and no answers.

They awkwardly go though the next two cars silently. Ford feels the silence growing heavy on his shoulders, sweat starting to build under his trenchcoat as he freaks out about breaking the quiet. He should say something, shouldn’t he? He thinks he needs to at least start a conversation with Stan, but what do they talk about? He feels like talking about what happened would be too fast, but the idea of making small talk makes him nauseous. 

Ford leads the way into a large cavern. At first he thought they were just in a deep ravine in the ground, but then he noticed that although the ceiling was high above them, that was glowing moss, and not stars. The mushrooms and algae around them glow in a blue hue, reflecting off the wet rocks. Water flows in small streams, and falls from stalactites, collecting into small pools and into streams. More algae grows from the areas where there’s water collecting, it makes the water glow a bright blue. 

He hears Stan let out a soft 'oh' and jumps on the opening. 

“its pretty.” He says softly.

Stan is quiet for a moment, making a strange face in the blue glow.

“Yeah. It is.” 

And just like that the conversation stops again. He’s awful at this. 

The two make their way through the cavern, coming across a village of tiny turtles who had buckets for shells. When they saw them, they rushed up to them, cheering. 

“You’re back! You’re back!” They cheer.

Back? 

Stan kneels down to them, “Hey there little guys” he says with a smile. He lifts his head up, addressing Ford. “Hey don’t pet them until your hands are clean” 

“You.. know them?” Ford asks, confused and surprised.

“Stan!” one says, “You brought back a companion!” “Who’s he? Who’s he?” “You got your clothes dirty!” “Just look at _his_ clothes! They’re almost as bad as Stan’s clothes were!” “Stan!” “clean, clean!” they speak over each other in their excitement. One of them goes to Ford, picking at his pant leg. He lifts his leg away from it.

“Uh, yeah.” Stan says, one of the turtles cleaning his hands of any of the black residue with a sponge it had in its bucket shell “I was heading through the train backwards, I’ve been through all these cars.” 

“Oh.” Ford says, watching as the turtles clean both of their clothes. One of them even takes out a small needle and thread and begins to mend his clothes seamlessly. “Why were you going backwards?” 

“Thought I could reach the back and jump through whatever magic tunnel the train came through to get to our world.” He says, petting the turtles' heads. The turtle chirps and pushes its head into his hand.

“Wash you top to bottom!” one says near his feet. “Down, down!” another yells. 

He kneels as he’s told and they begin cleaning his shirt and jacket. 

“Hey!” he laughs, one of them climbing up under his trenchcoat with a sponge. “that tickles!” 

“Scruba-dub-dub!” One says, near his ear. 

Stan jumps away from him.

It pours a bucket of water on him. 

Ford shouts in surprise as he’s suddenly soaking wet. Stan, who’s holding a turtle in his arm, bursts out laughing. The turtle that poured the water over him then begins to scrub soap into his hair, whistling while it works.

Stan starts laughing harder.

“You! You’re pouting!!” he sputters in laughter. 

“I am not!” Ford yells defiantly. Stan keeps laughing. “Stanley! Ugh stop that!” he yells at one of the turtles, who started to scrub his face. He shakes them off and stands, one of them tumbling out of his coat. 

“Woah! Hey, careful!” Stan says, rushing to the one that fell. He checks it over as Ford wrings out his coat. 

“These guys are fragile, Ford! Their shells are just made of plastic!” Stan yells at him.

That sends a spike through him. His project had been fragile too. 

Stan’s shoulders tighten, but he doesn’t say anything. 

“Is the turtle okay?” Ford asks. 

“yeah.” Stan says quietly. He stands up and continues past the village. He notices that there’s a small graveyard where three graves look newly made, the gravel looks different from the rest of the graveyard, and there are flowers on top of the stones used to mark them.

He doesn’t ask Stan about them, as he seems different than he had been before. Sullen again. Before leaving, Stan sets the small turtle on the ground near the door. 

Did he do something wrong? He hadn’t intentionally hurt the turtle, it had been in his trench coat and he was trying to stand up. Well, now he was soaking wet and covered in suds and Stan is mad at him. 

What an eventful train car.

Ford doesn’t know what he wants, still, he was annoyed by that on top of the remaining anger from the night of the science fair. He becomes more frustrated when he realizes that whether or not he figures out what he wants from Stan, getting anything from Stan will be a struggle. 

He just needs a break now, a few moments to reflect by himself. 

He doesn’t try to restart the conversation again, the silence that falls over them isn’t awkward like the one from earlier, but is simmering and tense. Like the moment before a predator pounces on a prey, the tension before the monster actually shows on screen in a horror movie, the seconds before the rope for a guillotine is released, or when a sentence is about to be given. There’s a fear in the feeling, an apprehension for what comes next, the penny is in the air, and the thickness of the tension beneath it slows it’s descent to a slow crawl. Yet what is to be done? He can’t force the answers to come for something as conflicting and nonsensical as emotions and feelings. 

So instead, he simply draws away and thinks. He’ll come up with an answer eventually, now that he’s thinking about the situation like what Chrome Ford wanted. It’s only a matter of time until he figures out what he wants.

For now, he and Stan enter into a car that appears to be made of small white cubes which stretch on out to the horizon and make up tall mountains. At the top of the mountains, teapots and tea cups balance precariously. Some of the teapots pour out a dark brown liquid from their spouts and onto the little cubes, where they erode to form rivers of what he presumes is tea. The closer tea cups and teapots are broken, the remnants of them shattered on the ground under the mountains they had rested on. 

“Damn her, you’ve got to be kidding me” Stan says under his breath. They continue on, Stan looking around at the broken pieces of ceramic as they pass through. 

Ford continues to think, trying to reason out what hes feeling and why he would be feeling like he is. There’s some logic to a few of the feelings, like how it’s logical to be angry at Stan for what he did, but it becomes illogical when a completely opposite feeling opposed it. Like how he looks at Stan and feels that ache in the center of his chest that tells him that the missed Stan. Anger is less complicated than having multiple feelings at the same time, which is why he always buried his other feelings with anger whenever he found himself getting tied up in nostalgia or homesick. If he was just angry with Stan, he would be able to shove the whole thing, feelings and all down into a deep hole in his mind. 

But, he supposes, there was still a reason why he felt the way he did, and shoving it down would just be ignoring a whole route of investigation. The scientist within him reminds him that feelings aren’t what he specialized in, that psychologists and philosophers should go bother with them instead of him. They get in his way and aren’t logical enough for his taste. But he ought to investigate them either way.

He lets himself feel for a moment.

Anger, hurt, those are less confusing. Grief, longing, familiarity, those make everything more complicated. He doesn’t understand. He remembers the chrome Stans' reunion, and the feeling of want becomes stronger, joined by a spike of grief. 

He looks at Stan’s back as he climbs over a small ledge. He remembers the adventures they used to have together, exploring the cave systems they found as children. Occasionally finding a strange bug or fish in pools of water deep underground. He remembers the shipwreck they found together, how they managed to drag it out of the cave by themselves and lug it across the beach. They had gotten badly sunburned that day, Stan becoming dehydrated enough to make him sick. Mom had almost called the doctor, but Stan had started feeling better after getting a lot of water and rest. His mind follows one path into another, reminding him of all the times they would sleep in Stan’s bed when one of them were sick or hurt, reading to the other from comic books, novels, and joke books, making each other laugh until the one who was sick would start coughing. 

His brain continues, bringing to mind events that were connected by small similarities. Him and Stan on the beach, burying each other in sand. Trying to remove all the sand from themselves, then ending up with rashes in the worst places when they missed some. Them on the swings as kids, talking after a run in with Crampelter and his gang. Another memory of them on the swings, but much older, talking about Ford’s school opportunity. Stan is saying something, but he can’t remember what. 

His mood shifts from nostalgic to bitter. That was before it happened, before Stan went to the school and sabotaged his project. His bitterness becomes outright anger. He almost stops himself from continuing before another memory comes into his mind. He sat on the same swing, sitting alone. His anger cools slightly, jarred by the change. It was the night after the incident. He was crying. Hot tears of brokenhearted grief running down to the grimace of anger on his face. 

He had felt so hurt, so angry, but still the tears were not anger, but they were tears of loss. Missing the person who had always say adjacent to him on these swings. 

Why? Why had he missed someone he was so angry at? Who he was hurt by? He thinks about that case he heard about on the news a few years ago in Sweden, those hostages who refused to testify against their captors after they were rescued. The media had called the phenomenon “Stockholm syndrome” named after the town that the event occurred in. Could he have that? Perhaps he felt so emotionally attached to Stan that he can’t help but feel confused about him. But he still felt angry at him, so perhaps not. Is it something else? Some neurological fallacy that’s making him have these counteractive feelings? 

He feels strange about it. Here he is, a scientist, and he’s asking himself about his own feelings. 

But as he watches Stan jump across a pond, from one stone to another, his memory plays back a scene from when they were looking for the Jersey Devil, younger Stan doing the exact same thing before slipping and falling into the water. Now, Stan manages to get across without falling, not needing Ford to help him up. 

He realizes how much they’ve both grown. 

How much he’s missed.

He realizes that despite his complicated feelings, he missed growing up with Stan 

He missed getting to watch him get to the point where he is now. All the failures, all the scrapes and bruises, the determination to try again. 

He realizes he definitely doesn’t want to miss any more of it. 

He thinks he wants Stan back for good, not just for a short visit, or a phone call from the other side of the country, but well and truly back. At his side and watching his back, living, growing, and being with him again. 

They leave the tea land car and move onto the next door, Ford leaving behind his reservations about what to do with Stan as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told y'all there would be turtles
> 
> (Also wow me, two cringey and obvious references in the same chapter? You dweeb, you absolute nerd.) 
> 
> :3< Land?
> 
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	8. NOT A CHAPTER, JUST SOME ANNOUNCEMENTS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will delete later!

Hey everyone! I am going to take a break from writing this for a few reasons: I'm too swamped with work, homework, personal life, and my mental health to write enough for full chapters every week, and it's making the chapters come out poorly (ex: last chapter). Plus since we are beginning to prepare for landing, I should make some extra preparation on the landing strip because OH DEAR GOD WE DON'T HAVE LANDING GEAR AND I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO FLY A PLANE. 

But seriously, the fic is going to be ending soon and I want to take some time to plan it out better. I had the entire fic plot line vaguely outlined from the start, with major plot points and some more specific details I thought up at random times while writing other chapters, but now that we're here, those outlines between here and the second to last chapter are a bit too vague for me to use to finish the fic with! So basically I have a big gap in between us and the landing strip that's completely unmapped, which is why last chapter was a **total mess**. (Probably will redo that one).

Thanks so much for reading, and I probably will be back to regular posting on a regular basis in no more than 2 weeks!

Another announcement cause I wanna be like that:  
I have plans for a few oneshots and maaaaybe a sequel or two? Who knows but **I'd love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on that!**

(You can also come talk to me about whatever @artisticarteriesart on Tumblr.com! I'd love to hear from you, so come on down!)


	9. Chapter 8: The Ballroom Car (New)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're given Stan's perspective once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes this is an actual chapter
> 
> Sorry about how long this took! A lot has been happening with my family since the quarantine started and it's been difficult to write.
> 
> Finish line in sight, folks.

Stan is confused. He’s a few things: melancholic, angry, sad, lonely, homesick, and very hurt, but more than anything, he’s very, very confused. His mind has been replaying the events of those not-even-two-hours again and again, trying to decipher them. He rescued Ford, the brother who he hadn’t seen for what? Seven, eight years? Then when they’re both safe, Ford immediately shoves a mistake he made when he was a teenager into his face, as if he hadn’t already beaten himself up about it all these years. Heck, the world has beaten him up for it all these years, the bad karma for messing up Ford’s project had to have been paid for by now, hadn’t it? But he guesses that Ford doesn’t know about how much he’s suffered already for his mistakes, because Ford had started to lob on some of the more tame things he imagined he would in his worst nightmares. The screaming match only lasted a few minutes, but the pain in his chest went on for another hour. He stalked off, not wanting to break down in front of Ford. 

Immediately after he got into the next train car, he turned around and slammed the meaty part of his fist into the door. He let out out an angry noise from his clenched teeth as he did, then another as he slammed his fist down again and again. He took a few minutes just letting out his anger, his hurt, feeling the distinct beginnings of a bruise on his hand. He stills, huffing, trying to catch his breath. He closed his eyes tightly, resting his forehead on the door in front of him. 

After all this time, Ford didn’t forgive him for one mistake he made in highschool. He had questioned Ford, the horrid realization that Ford shouldn't have ever even thought Stan would hurt him on purpose stopping him in his tracks. Ford didn’t answer him, his eyes hard and unforgiving. That was when Stan realized that there wasn’t any way to make up with his brother. Nothing Stan could say, do, or suffer through that would make it up to Ford. He had already done it all. He apologized, he suffered, he even saved Ford’s life. He could beg, but staring up to his bedroom window that night, asking for mercy, for help, was close enough to begging. But what then? If he’s done all this, then why would Ford forgive him if he begged for forgiveness? 

He let out a long, defeated breath through his mouth, raising his throbbing hand and resting the elbow against the door, his loose fist resting right over his head. 

He pushes off the door, feeling hollow. He shoves his hands into his jacket pockets, turns around, and starts walking. 

He barely remembers what happened between then and getting to that lake, but he started talking the Mirror Stan in the lake’s bubbly orange surface.

Mirror Stan looked up at him with a devastated and resigned frown.

“I’m sorry.” He had said.

“How could he think you would do that on purpose?” Mirror Stan had said, staring off into the distance.

Stan swallows, a bitter and emotional thing that goes down his throat heavily. 

“I can’t believe him.” Mirror Stan continues, “and I was so close…” his reflection closes his eyes and sighs. “we both could’ve had our brothers back.”

“You deserve to have your twin back. If I just had said something, told him about you and Mirror Ford then maybe he would’ve listened. I’m sorry.” Stan said. 

“It’s alright,” Mirror Stan shrugs. “you couldn’t do anything, he was being unreasonable.” 

“But I didn’t even try!” Stan had wailed.

Mirror Stan winced, rubbing the back of his neck. “Okay, maybe he’s cooled down a bit, you could catch up with him, try to-“

He had heard a noise and there was Ford. Two Fords, actually. One was just how he saw a few moments ago, the other was a shiny metal color. He’s shocked to see Ford’s reflection in the normal world. His reflection moved suddenly beneath him, dropping to a crouch to see what was going on from the lakes reflective surface. Mirror Ford runs down the chocolate hill to meet them by the lake shore, dropping down to his knees to see his brother.

“Ford? No, Mirror Ford?” Stan says, confused. 

“Ford! Wait, did you trap Prime Ford in the mirror world?!” his reflection says at the same time. Stan catches what he said, and turns his head back to Ford, double checking to make sure he’s still there. Mirror Stan had said that that was the only way for him to leave the mirror world, but somehow Ford had figured out another way.  
“No! We~” he could hear Ford’s reflection saying something, but when he met Ford’s eyes as he came closer, the confused hurt he felt in his entire body doubled and he felt like he was underwater. Sounds came to him in a dull, garbled static, going through layers of thick molasses surrounding him. 

“and that worked?!” his reflection exclaims. 

“Yes!” Mirror Ford answers with a big grin. Ford’s used to do that too, when they were younger. Grin with only his top teeth showing and his eyes squinting in glee whenever someone would acknowledge his intelligence.

Stan missed something, though. “Okay, wait,” Stan butts in, “how did you get out? I thought you could only swap places.”

“Yes, typically,” his reflection says, tilting his head to Stan, not completely looking up at him. “but we created an infinite loop by making me my own reflection by using a reflective surface to let me reflect myself out into the prime world.” 

“What?” Stan asks, one eyebrow up unamusedly. So both Fords have the inability to explain anything in English that doesn’t sound like a word puzzle, great. 

“We cheated by using a mirror against another mirror.” Mirror Ford says simply.

“Oh like those times I put Ma’s make-up mirror up against the bathroom mirror?” Stan says, snapping his finger. 

“Oh man, I felt like I was drunk for hours after that.” Mirror Stan pipes in. Mirror Ford chuckles. 

“I remember how you would sway and slur your words.” Mirror Ford says with love in his voice and oh- doesn’t that hurt. Stan feels the hole in his chest sink a bit deeper, it becomes a bit darker and a bit heavier inside him as he watches a mirror image of his twin remember something about his childhood with blatant fondness. He’s had that hole there ever since their pa threw him to the curb and it’s gotten deeper every time he looked at the picture of him and Ford he kept in his car, darker every time he calls Ford and hangs up before saying anything, and heavier every year on their birthday. “Remember when you tripped and fell? I still can’t believe no one noticed when I helped you up.”

Stan looks at Ford, Ford’s face is hardened as he looks away from the pair as they laugh. He doesn’t care, does he? He wouldn’t have been able to progress without Mirror Ford’s help. That’s the only reason why he’s here at all. There won’t be a tearful reunion, no forgiveness or even an ear to hear Stan’s explanations, no _love._ He doesn’t care at all. He wouldn’t thank Stan, why would he love him? 

It really doesn’t matter. No matter what Stan does for Ford it will never make anything up.

He can’t do it anymore.

He can’t keep letting himself set himself up for failure. He’s putting all his chips, everything he owns on a dump hand against an ace high straight flush. Ford holds all the cards and Stan’s very foundation beneath him is at stake. He really should just fold and cut his losses before he loses everything a second time. 

Accept defeat and leave the game entirely. Stop trying to win a pot that has everything he ever wanted and just play a different game. Go for a different prize, something more obtainable and less risky than the one he’s gambling for now. 

Accept that Ford may never love him again. Accept that the home he was kicked out of will never be a home for him again. Accept that Ma and Shermy are the only family he has left but even they can’t help him. 

Try and find something else to love. Something else to fight for. Something else to live for.

Finally let his brother go like he’s already let Stan go all those years ago.

He looks down, taking a breath that comes in shakily and comes out like a sigh. 

Mirror Ford told them about the Mirror Police, who would kill him if they found out what he’d done. Stan replies but barely remembers what he said. They ran through cars to reach the mirror car quickly in hopes that nobody will notice Mirror Ford’s escape. Everything passes by like he has cotton in his head. 

He helps Mirror Stan out by using one of his knuckle dusters and is almost trampled by Chrome Ford going in for a bear hug. He watches them with a hollow pang. 

It’s the picture of his wildest dreams. The reunion he would only imagine in his dreams happening- too mushy and sappy for real life or for them. He imagined that they would hug, imagined some crying and yelling, a few angry words that both would regret later. They would bring out the dirty laundry between them, hash out some bad blood, and eventually end up punching each other on the arms like they would when they would fight as kids. 

But this wasn’t like a fight they would have as kids, this was worse than the missing medal mystery, worse than when Ford was (inadvertently) a jerk after Carla left him; this was a sad end to a movie. Roll the credits, turn the lights back on, shuffle through a gross mixture of popcorn and soda pop and go home. Nothing to see here, folks, shows over. No there won’t be a sequel.

“Thank you.” He’s brought out of his thoughts, being addressed by Chrome Ford. Chrome Ford gives him a look and then looks at Ford. 

Stan swallows thickly before speaking, hoping that his voice won’t come out watery. “Where will you two go now?” 

Out of the corner of his eye, Ford turns to him. _Damnit. Don’t look at him. Don’t look at him._

“I’d like to explore the train, actually.” Chrome Ford says, smiling at Mirro- Chrome Stan.  
“I’m up for some adventure.” Chrome Stan grins at his brother, shaking him by the shoulder. Chrome Stan looks at him, then his eyes land on Ford. He instantly makes a face like he smelled dog crap. “What about you, Stan? Do you want to come with us for a bit?” he says, glaring at Ford. 

Stan barely processes what was just offered before Ford speaks up

“Actually I was thinking we should stick together, me and Stan, to find a way off the train, I mean.” Ford says in one breath. 

What? 

He stares at Stanford, shooting a look at the other two in the room who also are shocked.  
_What?_  
Wait.  
“..just to get off the train?” He clarifies.

“I- um. Yes, to get off the train. The train is dangerous as well it would be safer to stick together. I have no doubt you two will be safe?” he asks the chrome twins. 

There’s more talking but Stan isn’t listening, he’s thinking for once.

Ford wants to stick together? 

Even if it’s just until they get off the train, even if it’s just because he needs protection after almost getting hurt by the weird bug thing

Ford wants to stick together. Like, with Stan. Near Stan. In the same train car as Stan. 

But just a few hours ago Ford had hated him, had wanted nothing to do with him, so why is he saying that he wanted to be anywhere near Stan now?

Stan is horribly confused. 

Ford looks at him with a hopeful expression and Stan just nods, unsure what he just agreed to.

The chrome twins leave and Stan opens the opposite door for Ford.

-

Ford’s emotions are like a rollercoaster as they go through the train cars. Up, down, disorienting, and no fun for Stan. He’s always hated rollercoasters, ever since 4th grade when Crampelter and Tall Rob's older brother hoisted him up onto the gym basketball hoop and left him until Ford found him. 

Stan can’t seem to understand what’s going on inside Ford’s head. Every time he thinks he might be one way he turns the other way, getting chummy with Stan one moment and then snapping at him the next.

For example, they’re talking and laughing about the turtles, Ford gets soaked, he pouts, Ford snaps at him. Stan mentions that the turtles are fragile while making sure one is okay, and well guess what Stan my project was fragile too and you had no problem destroying that. 

Stan stays quiet after that. There’s something to being quiet, he’s learned over the years on the streets. When you don’t talk people will say things around you. It’s why Rico wants him dead so badly. People ramble when you’re quiet. 

While walking, Ford seems to be trying to make conversation with him, which he doesn’t reply to aside from a few words, ending the conversation quickly again and again. He doesn’t understand why Ford would be trying to talk to him, he doesn’t even understand why he invited Stan to go along with him in the first place. Then he goes and smashes the first good interaction they had since highschool right off the block in the first car they traveled through together. What gives? 

Their fight after Stan saved Ford hurt him so bad; he told himself that he was done hoping for Ford to take him back, it was too painful, too dangerous, too likely to get him hurt. He would never be able to stop caring about Ford, nor convince himself that he could, but he could maybe change his priorities. 

Since he was kicked out, his goal was to make the millions his pa had told him he needed to make. He wanted so badly to be accepted back into the family that he would try one big con after another. He knew working at a gas station or something wouldn’t make enough, but it might be enough to keep a small apartment. It wouldn’t bring him home but it would give him a roof over his head. He had kept his hopes up, even at his lowest points, the worst nights of a long run of terrible nights, when he thought he had really lost everything, he kept up the hope that one day he would be able to come home, so he never let himself do the safe, steady, and slow jobs. He needed fast cash to get his home back, so he couldn’t just give up and rebuild his life from scratch. 

Maybe that’s exactly what he needs to do. He needs to forget about trying to make that money and settle down as much as he can. Slowly and steadily he could carve out a new place for himself in the world.

That became the plan, anyway. Ford keeps crashing into it like a toddler into a house of cards. He never even gets that far, either. He’ll set up about four cards and then Ford takes a swipe at it unhelpfully. 

Once we get off this train I’ll find my car, drive to Al- “Wow this is nice,”

I can get a job there, they hire people without any papers all the- “This reminds me of the cave where the Jersey Devil lived.”

He felt like a mouse being chased by a cat who wasn’t even trying to kill him yet. Ford seemed content to play with him emotionally, get him hopeful before snapping at him. 

It was really- 

Annoying. Infuriating. 

Draining.

That’s the word for it. Stan felt himself being drained, like he was a lemon and his brother decided to make lemonade out of him. 

They walked through the familiar train cars before reaching the ball track car. When he had went through this car the first time, he had thought that Ford would love something like this. Balls jumped off the track to bounce off drums and into funnels, conveyor belts brought balls from the bottom of the track to the top, where they went through the whole thing again. The whole thing was really cool, and reminded Stan of the times he and Ford would dig trenches on the beach and watch things float down their little rivers. 

He paused once in the room. The whole place seemed spotless. 

It looked like Magalia didn’t even touch it. There had been a lot of damage in a few of the previous cars, but it looks like it’s petering down. 

“She didn’t destroy it?” Stan asks under his breath.

“Who?” Ford asks.

Stan gives him a side eye, his mouth open slightly and his brows furrowed, he searches Ford’s face-what is he doing- for a moment before answering- “This crazy chick, she was going through the train with her little posse wrecking everything.”

“Why are they destroying stuff on the train? I mean, look at this place!” Ford sweeps his arms out, motioning to the room in a grand gesture. They continue walking. “It’s amazing! Sure I understand getting annoyed at a few of the cars, but something like this? I don’t understand why anyone would-“ he stops, startled.

“What?” Stan asks

 _“what the-?”_ Ford says, looking around. Stan looks up, the ceiling looks like an upside down funnel, the area directly above Ford going higher than the bowl shaped ceiling around it. 

“Stan, can you not hear that?” Ford asks.

Stan is quiet for a moment, listening. All he can hear is the balls on their tracks. 

“My voice, Stan,” Ford says, looking around at the ceiling. “oh wait, you can’t hear it, can you? Come here” Ford reaches out to Stan and pulls him towards himself. Stan pulls his arm away from Ford’s grasp roughly.

“Stan I was just-“

Stan interrupts him, “what are you doing?” he asks quietly. 

Ford stops, “I was trying to show you- ?” 

“Not that, Ford! What do you want from me?!” Stan yells.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like I said, I am so sorry for how long this took. My family has been going through a lot, and it made writing this hard. 
> 
> I think this all makes sense, but because the writing progress was so stretched out, I might have written things confusingly. If you see anything, PLEASE SAY SO. 
> 
> On the bright side, I'm halfway done with the next chapter which will likely be the end!


	10. The Door Car

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Stans fight in the Ball Car

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH HEY CHAPTER 9 IS NEW IF YOU DIDN'T SEE IT LAST WEEK.
> 
> I'm saying that cause I think that since I deleted a chapter and then immediately uploaded one with a similar name as the deleted one, people thought it wasn't a new chapter. So if you remember they were in a fight at the end of the previous chapter than you're fine.

“Not that Ford! What do you want from me?!” Stan yells.

Ford feels his breath leave his body, “Stan-“

“A few train cars ago you couldn’t stand to look at me!” Stan interrupts, “Now you wanna be twins again? I don’t get it!” He yells, his voice grating as it peaks. “You pushed me aside, you jerk! It was supposed to be us forever!” 

“Stan, I just- I needed space, okay?” He stammers. He was sure now, at least, that he wanted to be twins again, even as he feels Stan verbally twist a knife into his heart. But even with the regret, Ford feels like he must defend his past actions.

“oh, so is that why you let Pa kick me out? You needed space?” Stan accuses bitterly, throwing his hands out to the side 

“No!” Ford insists “You had just taken away my dream school! I was angry- I said fine, Stan can just take the stan-o-war and leave, let him live his dream.”

“My dream?” Stan says brokenly, “All I wanted was to be with _you_ , Ford. That’s what my dream was! When you were leaving me behind, it felt like my world was ending.” Stan’s voice cracks, his eyes visibly wet at his confession. “I didn’t mean to break your machine. I didn’t even think it was broken when I left. I was angry, but I’d never intentionally hurt you like that. I- I can’t believe you’d think I would…”

Ford stops, shocked silent. He remembers all the times that Stan was beaten up by Crampelter and his goons for defending Ford, every time that Stan would switch with him to make sure he wouldn’t fail gym, the only class Stan got straight Bs in which could’ve been straight As had he not “missed” those days. Why had he believed that Stan had broken his project on purpose? Stan was clumsy and had broken his own glasses one too many times for their father’s standards, which is why he didn’t wear glasses after third grade. Stan had broken Ford’s glasses once, but nobody had accused him of doing so on purpose, unlike with his own glasses. 

So why had he thought Stan had harmed his project on purpose? 

He opens his mouth to say something, but Stan continues, likely thinking that Ford was completely speechless. Stan had always hated the silence.

“But you know the worst part? After everything, after you threw me away, after you forgot about me, I still.. I still cared.” Stan’s jaw flexes visibly, “I care now, even when you keep throwing me away, even when you don’t care about me,” he laughs a horrible bitter mockery of a laugh, “hell, even when I don’t care about me, I still care about you and what you think of me.”

A bright light comes from the palm of Stanley’s hand. He lifts it up, Ford close enough to see Stan’s palm. 

_0_

“The train thinks I’m ready to leave?” Stan says softly, breathlessly, like nothing he’s ever heard from his brother since right after Carla cheated on him. 

“What?” He asks. Stan knows what the number means?

Before Stan can answer, another light sparks out of nowhere, a line forms in the air, carving a line into the very fabric of space down to the floor. Two more lines spout from the top of the line and arch away from the center. It’s not until the symbol is etched into the center that Ford realizes that it’s identical to the doors of the train, but made of a glowing green light. Sure enough, the train symbol twists and the entire door glows brightly as the door opens. The light dimes and he can see the inside of the door where a vortex spirals to an image of a run down motel where he sees something he never expected to see again, the Stanmobile. Her red paint might be dulled and scratched up, but it’s unmistakably Stan’s car. 

Is this where Stan was? In some dingy motel who knows where? He looks at his brother, with his clean and immaculate jacket, strong build, and good complexion. He had assumed that he was doing well for himself, but looking at where he was spending his night didn’t match up with his appearance. 

“You- Stan? What is this?” Ford asks

He sees Stan swallow thickly.

“It’s.. a door, it’ll take us back to earth.” He answers obtusely.

“But where is that? Is that-“ Ford takes a breath, forcing himself to say it, “-is that where you were? When the train took you?” 

Stan cringes, his eyes looking away from the door, shying away from Ford's prying gaze. He was either ashamed or scared to tell Ford the truth. Not that Ford was any better, he’s scared of his brother's answer, he thinks he knows where this is going, and he doesn’t want to be proven right. 

“No.” Stan says, and Ford feels his shoulders relax as he lets out a breath before Stan continues, “The truth is, I was being chased by a cartel that wanted me dead when the train picked me up.” 

Ford feels his heart clench in the most painful ways, his brain sputters like a dying engine as he takes in what Stan had just said. Stan keeps his face turned away from Ford, who’s barely looking at him now, instead looking at an invisible middle space as he comes to terms with just what’s come of Stan’s life. 

G-d he screwed up

“God I screwed up” 

Stan looks at him sharply

“What?” Stan asks, confused.

“Stan, what happened? After Pa- after I let you go that night.” Ford says numbly.

Stan sighs like he’s accepted his fate. 

“A lot, to put it simply. At first it was just about making the money Pa told me to make, but pretty soon..” he stops for a moment, looking down and away from Ford to scowl at the ground. “It was about feeding myself, keeping myself alive. I started off trying to sell products I thought I could make some money off of, but then I got desperate, fighting in illegal rings, smuggling and selling drugs, doing whatever it took.” 

Stan is quiet again, closing his eyes in shame and bitterness. Ford tries desperately to absorb it all, trying to connect the headstrong and loving brother he knew to the desperate criminal he’s making himself out to be. He put Stan there. He and his father let lovable Stan be put into a position where it was either do those things or die. More than that, they put him there themselves and then _pretended not to care_. 

Ford presses his lips together in a tight frown and blinks away tears. He can’t believe himself. His reflection was right, Stan was right, he threw his brother away for one mistake and did everything to not let himself think about him. How could he do something like that to the one person who was always there? The kid who stood up against their bullies, the teen who took their father’s anger when Ford’s glasses were broken by Crampelter, the hero who had time and time again picked him up when he called himself a freak. 

Ford must’ve taken too long to reply, as Stan looks back at him and takes in a sharp breath. Stan takes a step towards him and Ford hugs himself with one arm while the other comes up to cling to his own neck. He speaks before Stan has a chance to.

“I’m _sorry_ ” he sobs, the tears breaking through his efforts to keep them in. 

“Ford?” he hears Stan ask, but Ford keeps his face down. 

“I’m so sorry, Stanley.” He says, taking deep breaths to try and calm himself before continuing. “You didn’t deserve that to happen to you. I was just so angry- but- I-“ he looks up at Stan who looked like he was about to cry as well. “I’ve missed you, Stan.” 

“You-?” Stan says, confused and a little too shocked for Ford’s tastes. He shouldn’t be confused or shocked to know that Ford missed him. 

“I missed you, Stanley.” Ford repeats, nodding.

His hand glows a bright green, just as Stan’s did. It’s light joining the light of Stan’s number, still glowing in his palm. Just as it did for Stan, a line creates an image of the doors of the train and opens up to reveal his house in Gravity Falls. 

They’re both silent for a moment.

“Awful timing, huh?” Stan says, a watery smile on his face.

“Right when we actually start getting somewhere, so it seems.” Ford shoots back a small smile of his own. “Stan, let’s not fight anymore.” 

Stan looks at him with a tight lipped smile before he throws his arms around Ford. Ford wraps his arms around Stan and it feels like everything is better, but not perfect. Like a drawing that just feels incomplete, not horrible, but missing something. 

“Stan,” Ford says into his brother’s shoulder, “Come up to Gravity Falls. Stay with me there.” 

Stan’s breath hitches and he hugs Ford tighter. Ford feels Stan shaking and he can’t help but sniffle, hoping not to start crying again. 

An awfully long but wonderful moment passes with Ford holding Stan tightly, before they release. Stan wipes his eyes as discreetly and shyly as he can, trying to convince Ford that he wasn’t crying and failing. Ford doesn’t tell him so, he’ll wait until their relationship is on slightly better terms to start making jabs at him like they used to. 

Ford pulls out his journal, the outline of a missing handprint bringing him a sense of hope and pride. He opens to a new page and tears out a small slip of paper. He brings it to a wall and pens in his address and phone number. Giving it to Stan. “I think you’ll like it there, it has so much more than just a single monster like the Jersey Devil. I think it would be handy to have another person to help me and my friend with the project we’re working on.” 

“Project..? You’re sure you want me helpin' with something like that?” Stan meekly asks.

“Of course. I- Stan, it was an accident, right?” Ford pauses until Stan nods. “then we just have to be careful. And talk about things before they get out of hand..” Ford looks away as he says this, saddened that all of this could’ve been avoided by talking about it. He looks back up at Stan, who looks thoughtful. He hugs him again, briefly. “I’ll see you in Gravity Falls, Stanley.” 

Stan looks up at him, smirks, and hits him lightly in the shoulder. “Yeah, Sixer, I’ll see you soon.”

They face their doors and go to stand in front of them. They share a look, Stan nodding at Ford and Ford giving a sharp nod back before stepping into the door.

- _THREE DAYS LATER_

Stanford is, as he had been yesterday, waiting anxiously for sight of the red car carrying Stanley. The day after he got back, he had spent cleaning out a room for his brother. 

The night he had gotten back, he had walked back into his house and been welcomed by the sight of Fiddleford sleeping on the couch in the front room, the phone base pulled up to the end table, the receiver buzzing in his hand hanging off the couch. Papers were scattered all over the table, but that wasn’t anything new, what was new was the papers’ contents. News clippings of disappearances all over crook county spanning the last hundred years, maps of Gravity Falls and all over Oregon, and his other journal laying open on the page about tulpas, with multiple new bookmarks sticking out all through the book. 

He knelt down to Fidds and gently shook his shoulder, “Fidds?” he whispered, a smile on his face. 

Slowly, Fiddleford's eyes opened, saw him, and then suddenly snapped open. He pushed himself up quickly. “STANFORD!” he exclaims.

Ford was caught up in a hug right then, his friend holding him up against himself tightly. Ford grins brightly and chuckles lightly, enjoying Fidd’s enthusiasm.

The moment only lasts a moment, however, as Fiddleford pushes him back by the shoulders, keeping him where he wants him. “Where in tarnation were you? I looked everywhere from here to Timbuktu! I done tuned up for days worried sick about where’d you gone to, Ford!” He cries worriedly, wiping one of his eyes with the palm or his hand. 

“It’s a bit of a story- I got taken on an anomalous train- I think it might exist on another dimension entirely, forming gateways to lure people from all over our world into it’s dimension-“ Ford yawns suddenly, realizing how long it’s been since he’s had a cup of coffee. For as much the train had food and liquids, it didn’t have much coffee. “I need coffee, do we have any?” he asks.

Fiddleford pushes out a breath that sounds long suffering in tone. Instead of answering, he drags Ford up by his arms and stands up from the couch. He leads him to the stairs rather than the kitchen and when Ford hesitates is when Fiddleford speaks: “I have been up worrying these past two weeks, we’re going to bed, we can talk more in the morning.”

Ford was about to argue, when he yawned again and chose to comply instead. 

“Oh hey, you found him.” A voice said sleepily. He looked over to the source and found a gnome wearing a night cap and gown rather than their customary clothes walking out of the kitchen doorway. 

“Did you kidnap a gnome?” Ford asked, surprised.

“Naw I’ve been feeding them for any information they could dig up on you.” Fiddleford pushed him further up the stairs.

Ford hummed a thoughtful noise and continued up the stairs. 

The next day he had explained everything to Fiddleford, including everything about his brother. Fiddleford had heard his side of the story of the night Stan was kicked out before, but now he made sure to include a few amendments, like how Stan acted the days leading up to the event. He hadn’t before mentioned how insecure Stan seemed about their relationship, or how quiet and worried he was after the meeting with the principal- he’ll have to ask about that later. He mentioned how Stan had played it off as said it was an accident, but now he told him that not only was the machine working when Stan left- another thing to ask about later, but that Stan had never been known to hurt him or anyone in their family like that and the few times he broke something of anyone’s, it was completely accidental.

Of course, the girlfriend stealing hippy's van he damaged on purpose. 

Then they had cleaned out a spare room and made it into a bedroom in a day and a half, using the size altering crystals to make moving the bed in easier. 

Now he just had to wait, which was what he did half of yesterday and most of today. He received a quick call earlier when Stan made it into Oregon safely, both to let him know that he was a few hours out and also to make sure that Ford wanted him to come. He had let out a relieved breath audible enough for the receiver to pick up when Ford had excitedly picked up the phone asking if it was Stan calling, which broke his heart a little, but he was glad to hear his voice either way. 

Fiddleford brought him lunch and dinner and sat with him for hours, alternating between talking with him, working on his computers, and picking at his banjo for the majority of the day. 

With both of them occupied, no work had been done on the portal for two and a half weeks.

Bill hadn’t been happy with the delays, especially when they were so close, but he was interested in hearing about the train. Apparently, it existed outside both Bill and Ford’s dimensions so unless a gateway opened, neither could access it. Bill hadn’t known much, but Bill had at least heard about it before, apparently it opens gates around a few different universes, but often only takes in human riders and mimics non-human species and planets. All of this info from Bill was then transcribed into his journal which was still missing it’s cover, but with how much was used just on the train, he thinks he’ll have to rebind the journal, removing those pages to add them to another journal just on the train. He wants his main journals to focus primarily on Gravity Falls' weirdness, and since the train was attracted to him and not the town, he thinks he’ll keep it short in his journal and the more in-depth in a separate book. 

That evening, as the sun was low and the shadows of the towering oak and pine trees consumed his house in a twilight darkness, he glimpsed the Stanmobile through the trees seconds before it pulled up to the house. Stan got out two moments after parking it and Ford was there to greet him with a hug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The story will continue in Book Two

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
